Nobody ever won a war by dying for their country. They won the war by making some other poor bastard die for their country.
Your post reminded me of Richard Cohen's column yesterday. This is the first part. Times have changed.
<<On one day in World War I, the British army lost 19,240 men. That was July 1, 1916, a Saturday. A single regiment, the storied 1st Newfoundland, was virtually annihilated. Maj. Gen. Sir Beauvoir de Lisle, reporting on what had happened, wrote, "It was a magnificent display of trained and disciplined valor, and its assault only failed of success because dead men can advance no further."
Contrast that day -- if you will, if you can -- with a much more recent one when Sgt. Nathan Ross Chapman, assigned to the Special Forces, was killed in Afghanistan. That we even know his name would be inconceivable to the survivors of World War I or, for that matter, almost any other war. A single death hardly would have been considered significant.
The virtually nonexistent U.S. casualty rate is either a signal achievement or a debacle in the making. At the moment, no one can say for sure. The fact remains that America's war aims may well be compromised by America's reluctance to "take casualties" -- a euphemism only slightly less silly than de Lisle's "magnificent display.">>
washingtonpost.com |
